we dance the best we know
by wild wolf free17
Summary: They sit across the table from each other, in a room in Stiles' mind. Stiles eats curly fries one a time and the fox just watches. [AU during 3.19]
1. Chapter 1

Title: we dance the best we know

Disclaimer: not my characters; title from Kate Seredy

Warnings: Goes AU during Letharia Vulpina, and AUish for everything that came before.

Pairings: none

Rating: PG

Wordcount: 1960

Point of view: third

* * *

_Look out for Deaton_, a voice whispers in the back of the mind. _He's tricky_.

So when there's barely a whisper of displaced air (he's trained himself for silence, dealing with werewolves), the fox hears it. The fox reacts as quick as a wolf and catches the hand holding poison, and then makes a small noise of disapproval.

Deaton lands next to Kira on the floor. Scott is still gasping and whimpering, and the fox leans in to press a gentle kiss to his forehead. "Be good," the fox whispers.

_Please_, a voice begs in the back of the mind. _Don't hurt him anymore._

_Of course not_, the fox says. _What's yours is mine._

The fox leaves the clinic, but pauses outside the door: three oni are still on the ground. He smiles. The little fireflies flicker in the rain and barely struggle as he crouches down.

_What now?_ the voice asks as the fox trails his fingers along the jeep. He leaves it and keeps walking.

_We have to talk_, the fox says. _But first, I have to find a safe place._

The voice says nothing else and the fox walks.

.

He's sitting at a table eating curly fries one at a time when the fox sits down across from him, identical in every way. "Want some?" he asks.

"No, thank you," the fox says.

He shrugs and grabs another fry.

Tilting his head, the fox asks, "Why did you warn me about the emissary?"

He pauses with a fry halfway to his mouth, sets it down, meets the fox's eyes. "Because… because my mother once told me that doors are meant to be open."

The fox smiles, smug and slow. "She was a wise girl, Claudia. The fit was… almost right."

"The door wasn't to the nemeton, was it," he says, and it's not a question.

"Oh, no," the fox replies. "I've been here from the moment of your conception." He taps his fingers on the table. "I came over from the Philippines with your great-grandfather, went to your grandfather, and then your mother. And then there was you." He grins, teeth glinting. "There was you. I crawled inside and made myself comfortable, and I slept."

"The frontotemporal dementia?" he asks, shoving another fry into his mouth.

The fox says, "Haven't you noticed people die young in your family? Your great-grandfather died when your grandfather was barely toddling around, your grandfather just after your mother went to the big kid's school, and your mother – she held on for nearly a decade, just for her baby boy."

His hand clenches around the fry, but he says nothing. The fox continues, "She locked me away inside your head with the very last of her power. She was almost exactly what I needed, but not… quite… right." The fox reaches out to pat his hand. "You, though. You're perfect."

He closes his eyes. The fox says, "She locked me away, but you opened the door."

"And what's the plan?" he asks, opening his eyes to glare at the fox. "What the hell has all this been about, bombs and electricity and what the fuck ever else you've been doing – what's the point?"

"Chaos," the fox says. "And strife, and pain. We're tricksters. We trick everyone – even ourselves." The fox pats his hand again. "When is a door not a door? Everyone has it but nobody can lose it. They go together, baby boy." The fox grips his hand, pulling him across the table, getting right up in his face. "A jar, you told me. And a shadow. Neither was right, so tell me now." Claws dig into his wrist. "_Tell me now_."

He tries yanking his arm away; the claws just go in deeper, cutting him to the bone. "You were born for me," the fox snarls. "The door is not a door, and everyone has it. Nobody can lose it. You're the clever one, so clever. So answer the riddle."

The blood sounds so loud as it drips onto the table, the only noise besides his gasps and the fox's steady breaths. Not a jar, he thinks. Not a shadow. His arm throbs and the fox slowly lets go, still glaring at him; the fox's other hand gently curls around his throat, one finger pressing lightly into his pulse.

"You won't kill me while you're in here," he mumbles, wrapping his own hand around the furrows in his wrist.

"What is the one thing neither of us has said?" the fox asks.

He stares into the fox's eyes and then lets his head fall.

.

The fox carefully settles the boy back into his chair. "Do you remember when you became Stiles?" he asks. "You were nine years old. Your mother had been in the ground for five months. Your father had finally crawled out of the bottle and could bear to look at you again."

"Please," the boy whimpers, blood-soaked napkin wrapped around his wrist, head in his hands. "Please stop."

"Your mother called you her _lítið Refr_, her sweet baby boy, such a clever boy. But your father – long-suffering, kind – he could not pronounce it, could he?" The fox leans in, resting his chin on the top of the boy's head. "No, no one but Mama could pronounce her baby's name – and so you cast it away. But you never lost it, did you? Oh, no no, you didn't."

_"Please,"_ the boy begs again, trying to jerk away.

The fox merely tightens his grip, arms around the boy. "Your mother locked me in your head and you became Stiles. Stiles Stilinski." The fox laughs while the boy shudders. "Tell me, _Stiles_ - what name did your mother give you? What name did you cast into the dark, behind a locked door, where you never thought it again?" And he shifts slightly, putting his mouth right next to the boy's ear, to murmur, "When is a door not a door? What does everyone have and nobody lose?"

"A name," the boy whispers, voice thick.

"Tell me," the fox commands, just as softly, "what is mine?"

"Refr," the boy says.

"Such a clever _clever_ boy," the fox croons, rocking the boy back and forth in his arms. "Clever like a fox."

"I don't understand," the boy says, bringing his hands up to cling to the fox's arms. "Please, what do you want?"

"I've been locked away for half your life," the fox says, pulling back and turning the boy's head so that they are eye-to-eye. "I want only to see the world again. I crawled into your great-grandfather, and his son, and his daughter, and then you – because of a tiny little spark."

The fox suddenly lets go, lunging away, gesturing to the empty walls around them. "We're in your mind, _Stiles_, in the tiny little room where I slept. Your mother didn't work, or her father, or his – but you, _you_, clever boy, _you_ were made for me."

"But what does that mean?!" the boy screams, shooting to his feet and kicking at the table. "What the fuck do you want?!"

"You!" the fox screams right back, once more getting in the boy's face. "I want a body again. I want to interact through more than a _ihost_/i, I want to breathe and feel and taste. I almost did with your mother, but she refused to go the final step. She refused me, Refr! She refused me and locked me away." The fox sags down, hanging his head. "She locked me away inside the perfect vessel and forced me to _sleep_."

The boy just looks at him, clenching his fists. "That's not my problem," he says.

The fox laughs sharply. "Oh, baby boy, yes it is."

.

"My name," he says, "is Stiles. Refr doesn't exist, and hasn't since you killed my mother."

"No," the fox replies. "Refr was just sleeping inside you."

He shakes his head. "I'm not – I won't help you. You're going to kill everyone I love and I'm not gonna help you."

The fox leans in and murmurs against his lips, "What's yours is mine. What's mine is yours. I will love what you love and hate what you hate. I will have your spark. You will have… all that I am." His hands gently cradle the boy's face. "We will be together always, _lítið Refr_, completely as one. Neither of us will ever be alone again."

Stiles shakes his head. "No."

"We'll never be forgotten," the fox says. "Never left behind or ignored. We'll be one, completely." He looks Stiles straight in the eyes. "Don't you want that?"

"No," Stiles says weakly. "No, I don't."

"You're lying," the fox says with a tiny little smile.

"You'll love who I love?" Stiles asks. "You won't hurt them?"

"I'll be you," the fox says, wrapping his arms around Stiles' shoulders, "and we'll be we. For the rest of my life – and I'll live a very long time." He smiles. "_iWe'll_/i live a very long time."

"But chaos, and strife, and pain," Stiles says.

"You already cause those without me," the fox says, a little laugh in the words. "This is just… an upgrade."

Stiles closes his eyes and lets his cheek rest against the fox's. "Never alone inside my head again?"

"Never," the fox promises.

"And what about the oni? Deaton? Will they be able to tell you're there with me?"

"No," the fox says. "I won't be there. You won't be there. _iWe'll_/i be."

Stiles takes a deep breath and pictures his father's face the day he cast aside the name his mother gave him. "We'll protect them if something happens?"

The fox nods. "We will be the same, never parted."

Stiles asks, "And Scott? You won't hurt him again?"

"Never," the fox promises.

"What about tricking everyone?" Stiles asks, one hand clutching the back of the fox's shirt. "That's what you told Scott."

"We don't trick ourselves," the fox says, "not when it's important. And this? I can't trick you about this." The fox nuzzles in, letting his forehead rest in the crook of Stiles' shoulder and neck. "You have to agree, knowing everything. No lies , _ilítið Refr_. No trick and no traps. Just me and just you, here."

"Us," Stiles whispers.

"Yes," the fox murmurs into his throat. "Us."

.

"Stiles!" Scott shouts, barely outrunning the oni. "Stiles!"

The oni pushes past him and grabs Stiles by the shoulder, spinning him around to stare into his eyes. The rest of Scott's pack, and Kira, and Sheriff Stilinski surround them, but the oni doesn't look away, and neither does Stiles.

Finally, the oni lets him drop and vanishes into smoke. "Stiles!" the sheriff shouts, slamming down beside him and turning him over. "Stiles!"

Scott crouches down next to them and looks behind Stiles' ear, which finally has the same sigil as everyone else. "It's not…" he says. "The nogitsune isn't in him anymore? Where'd it go?"

"Dad," Stiles cries, throwing himself into his father's arms. "Dad, I'm so sorry, I'm sorry."

"I've got you, son," the sheriff says. "It's alright now. I've got you."

.

Their father takes them home, after the hospital, after the interviews. Amnesia, they claim for the official report. No memories after the MRI. For the pack, for Kira and her parents, for Deaton, for Dad – there were glimpses, a few, where Stiles was able to glance out. But he couldn't stop it. Couldn't fight. Could only scream and beg and plead. Locked inside.

They sleep easily. In the morning, they hug their dad and eat breakfast and lounge on the couch, watching a program about baleen whales. (No school for the rest of the week, doctor's orders.)

_Baleen whales are cool_, they think, grabbing their laptop. _We should go to the ocean sometime._

_We will_, they decide.


	2. Chapter 2

Warnings: same as before. Just going more AU for the future. *shrugs*

Prompt: Author's choice, author's choice, "Death plays dice with a knucklebone, and the Devil cheats at cards. Ain't nobody sayin' what game God's playin', but it's goin' the whole nine yards."

* * *

Stiles is quiet, in the aftermath. He keeps his head down at school, doesn't really speak at pack meetings, lets his dad eat whatever he wants.

"Stiles is not okay," Scott announces at a pack meeting Stiles never got an invitation to.

"Would you be?" Kira asks.

"No," Scott admits quietly.

.

The sheriff is worried about his son. He talks about it with Melissa and Chris sometimes, and even with Derek once. They reach no conclusions, but the sheriff feels a little better after.

"Just give him time," Melissa counsels. "What he's been through – he just needs time."

So the sheriff does. He waits for Stiles to come to him, and he talks about inconsequential things, and he sits at the table with Stiles as he catches up on his schoolwork.

Stiles doesn't really listen to music anymore, but the sheriff plays some of Claudia's old favorites.

(The second MRI came back clean. Stiles is in the clear. The nogitsune is gone. No one knows where or why.)

Once, Stiles asks, "Dad, why did you forgive me so easily?"

The sheriff answers honestly, "Because it wasn't you."

.

_Something's wrong_, Lydia thinks, watching Stiles watch the pack train. The twins are trying to take on Derek and Isaac while Scott tries to take them all down. Kira is trying to ignite Allison's arrows as she shoots them into the air.

She didn't see Stiles while the nogitsune was in him. Only Scott and Deaton did, and Scott cried while he talked about it, and Deaton said only, "The shadow is gone."

Nothing about him _sounds_ different, but she doesn't trust her senses anymore. She hasn't mentioned the feeling of _wrongness_ to anyone, not even Allison, the first one to trust her about them.

Stiles meets her eyes with a small grin; Lydia shivers in a sudden cold breeze that no one else seems to notice.

.

_Chaos_, the nogitsune said. _Strife. Pain_. Alan sits in his office, running his fingers through rowan ash, and thinks. There is no trace of the nogitsune, all of the oni are gone, and the two kitsunes in town don't sense the shadow anymore.

But where did it go? What was its purpose in Beacon Hills? Why Stiles Stilinski?

Since he was a little boy, Stiles Stilinski was always playing pranks, getting into trouble. Never anything too dangerous, no one ever came to harm – just little things. Mischievous.

And then he dragged Scott McCall into the woods where an alpha werewolf prowled.

What is it the sheriff always says? Once is an incident. Twice is a coincidence. Three times? A pattern.

Why Stiles Stilinski? Because of his history as a troublemaker? Because of the surrogate sacrifice? Because of his place in the pack, or as the sheriff's son?

Stiles can still use the ash, which is the only reason Alan hasn't mentioned his concerns to anyone. He can still use the ash which means that the nogitsune has truly left him.

.

_The pack is worried_, they think. _Dad, too_. They turn the page of the biology book, stare down at the fox's skeleton. Smile.

_We'll just have to do better_, they think. _But the chaos… it sure does taste good_. They laugh and leave the book, going to start dinner for Dad.


	3. Chapter 3

Warnings: talk of death&violence

Prompt: Any, any,  
_Delicate in every way but one (the swordplay)  
God knows we like archaic kinds of fun (the old way)  
Chance is the only game I play with, baby  
We let our battles choose us_  
- 'Glory and Gore' by Lorde

* * *

The next thing that comes to town is an alpha werewolf after Peter. If he was _only_ after Peter, they might not have gotten involved. But first, he goes after Derek, while Scott is taking werewolf lessons, and of course Scott gets in-between the alpha and Derek, and that. Well.

Together, Derek and Scott beat the alpha, but barely.

_What's yours is mine_, the fox had said. Had promised. _I will give to you… all that I am_.

Stiles had been a spark, and the fox a shadow. But now they are both. Now they are both, and the pack is _theirs_, and nothing touches what is theirs. Nothing that lives.

.

"A vote," Scott says. "He only wants Peter, and none of us should die to protect him." A part of him doesn't want to say it – but if _anyone_ in the room shouldn't live, it's Peter Hale.

Peter rolls his eyes. "I can be a great help to you, Scott. Don't forget – you are an alpha now only because I bit you."

Stiles scoffs loudly. "That was by pure chance, you asshat, and you know it."

The whole pack, plus the pack auxiliary of the sheriff, Mom, and Argent, turn to look at him. "I offered you the bite, Stiles," Peter practically purrs. "You would have been magnificent."

"You did _what_?" Derek, Scott, and the sheriff all shout at the same time.

Peter shakes his head, chuckling. "You've been advocating my death since I came back to life, Stiles," he says. "But you know what a help I can be."

"If you'd bitten me, Peter," Stiles says, head tilting, "I wouldn't be able to do this."

Scott and all of the wolves cringe as Stiles' fingers flick and a circle of - _something_ settles around Peter. "That… that is not mountain ash," Peter says, voice shaking just a little.

Stiles smirks. "You learn a lot when you can't sleep," he says conversationally, stepping forward. "When you stay awake all night, reading the most obscure texts someone thought to upload. When there's a darach and an _alpha_ pack and fucking _demons_." He stops at the circle and Scott doesn't recognize the smile on his face. "You learn things to protect your own."

"Stiles," the sheriff calls, moving towards him.

"Dad," Stiles says, holding up a hand, "Peter is not one of us. He never has been. And I vote we leave him staked out for that alpha, and then if the alpha doesn't leave, we cut him in half."

"That has my vote," Lydia says, raising her hand.

"And mine," Allison adds.

The twins nod, hands raised, and then Mom, after a moment, eyes only on Scott. Argent raises his hand, too, and Isaac.

Peter looks around the room and finally focuses on Scott. "That's eight votes for my death, True Alpha. That's the majority." He looks back at Stiles. "You've changed."

Stiles laughs, bitterly and cold. "No," he says, "I really haven't. I've just learned."

With a deep inhale, Stiles turns to face Scott. "It's up to you," Stiles tells him.

Scott steps up beside him and orders Peter, "Leave Beacon Hills. We'll tell the alpha you're gone. What happens after that is not my concern." Scott waits a beat. "Everyone out."

The twins leave first, then Isaac, pulling Allison and Kira with him. Argent, then Mom and the sheriff. Lydia shoots Peter a truly hateful smile on her way out, and then it's just Derek and Stiles and Scott.

"I'll… I'll give you some time," Scott tells Derek. "And then Stiles will break the circle. And if you're still here tomorrow, Peter, then I – I'll let Argent handle you. Okay?"

"Of course, alpha," Peter says, a smile that looks more like a snarl on his face. "Thank you for your mercy."

Scott leaves.

.

"Do you… you want me to leave?" Stiles asks after a moment. Derek doesn't look up at him, or at Peter. Doesn't say a thing. "Oh, okay, so I'll just hang here," he says.

Finally, Derek looks up, looks with his blue eyes, and says, "Goodbye, Peter." He rushes out the back, away from the pack, away from his sister's killer, away from it all.

He doesn't slow down when Isaac joins him, or Scott. He just runs.

.

"I know what you are," Peter tells them as they break the circle. "What's to stop me from letting everyone know on my way out of town?"

They glance at him, smiling, letting their teeth sharpen just a little. "Fox's got your tongue, wolf," they say. "If you're here at dawn, we'll get the rest of you, too."

Peter chokes as his tongue _burns_, doubles over at the pain – and then it's gone. He tries to ask, "What the fuck was that?" but he can only move his lips. His tongue is completely still.

"You can eat," they explain, walking towards the door. "You can drink. You can lick your lips, even your balls, if you want. But you can never say another word to our pack." They throw a smile over their shoulder, adding, "You can't write about it, either, or text, or email. Nada. Zilch, zero, the empty set."

And they close the door. The only person waiting outside is Dad, and he asks, "You had the chance to be a werewolf?"

They nod. "I didn't want it then, Dad," they say. "Not like that, and not from him. I don't want it now, either, but if – if those scans hadn't been because of the nogitsune, Scott was gonna turn me."

Dad nods, reaching out to clutch their shoulder. "Good," he says, voice shaking. "That's good, son."

They throw their arms around him. "Let's go home, Dad."

_Pain_, they think, as Dad starts the cruiser, glancing back towards the warehouse and the werewolf that has yet to take a step out of the circle. _It tastes kinda like fire._


	4. Chapter 4

Prompt: author's choice, any, like something out of a Edgar Allan Poe story

Warnings: same as before. Mentions of violence/death. Some pre-Sterek feels.

* * *

Something's been wrong with Stiles since the nogitsune. Well, of course, it'd be weird if Stiles _hadn't_ been slightly off because someone took his body for a ride without his permission, and hurt people, and _killed_ people - Derek knows what killing can do to a person. But that's not it.

Stiles was quiet, after, and kept mostly to himself for a few weeks. Then he shook the melancholy off and went back to being himself – though still just a bit quieter. A bit smaller.

And his scent… it changed. Just enough for Derek to notice, but no one else did, not Isaac or Peter or even Scott. _Scott_ not noticing made Derek doubt himself for a while. But then that alpha intruded, after Peter, and Stiles –

Derek doesn't know what kind of ash that was Stiles used, but Peter did. Peter was _afraid_ of it. Derek left him there, trapped in that circle, and then Peter was gone the next morning. And no one looked at Stiles differently than they already had since the nogitsune left him, but Derek just – something's _wrong_.

Just slightly off. Enough to notice, but not enough to figure out what it is. Deaton and Kira and Mrs. Yukimura and the _oni themselves_ declared him free and clear. No more demon fox, no more dark spirit. Just Stiles.

Just Stiles, who thought it'd be fun to find a body, who took a bat to the twins, who apparently turned down Peter, who drove a jeep into a kanima. Stiles who smells like dark earth and smiles like a moonless night.

Peter's gone, so Derek's the oldest werewolf left in the pack (not that Peter ever really _was_ in Scott's pack). Derek's down one more family member (again) and he doesn't trust the twins at all (most days, he imagines digging his claws into their ribcages and _pulling_) and he can't relax if either of the surviving Argents are present. So why did he come back? Why is he staying?

"Hey, Derek," Stiles calls, throwing his booksack onto the floor as he sinks down onto the couch. "Guess we're early, huh?"

Scott and Isaac are at lacrosse practice; Stiles quit the team after the nogitsune left. The twins, Allison, and Lydia are watching the practice; so is Kira, Derek's pretty sure. Argent's wherever he goes and doing whatever he does, while the sheriff and Melissa are at work.

So it's just Derek, slouched down in the recliner, and Stiles, laid out on the couch, at Scott's house. "We have about an hour," Stiles announces. "Why don't you just ask what you've been wanting to ask for months?"

Derek takes a deep breath and watches Stiles' chest rise and fall. His heartbeat is steady. His heartbeat is _always_ steady now. Like he's finally settled into his skin. He's calmer now, after the demon fox, than he'd ever been before.

He never smells like fear anymore.

Derek exhales and doesn't ask.


	5. Chapter 5

Prompt: any, any, waking up and discovering you've misplaced something important

Warnings: same as before, except add in the beginnings of a panic attack.

* * *

He wakes up alone in his head. He blinks up at the sky because he's not on his bed; he's on - he pauses to think, digs his fingers down into dirt and leaves.

Shit. He's outside, shivering, alone in his head. What the fuck happened last night?

Wait. Is he awake? He brings up his fingers to count them; he's only got ten. So he's awake. Right?

_Hello?_ he thinks, biting down sharply on his tongue to control the panic before it gets to be too much. _Fox?_

It's been three months since they melded, him and the fox, and he can't be alone in his head anymore. Fox i_promised/i_. Never alone, never again. Never left behind.

But he's alone. His head is empty.

He rolls over to his hands and knees and then rises slowly, unsteadily. It's been i_their/i_ body and now it's _his_, and it doesn't feel right at all. Not a bit. And he can't go to anyone for help because nobody knows the fox never really left. They won't help him get it back.

Glancing around, he realizes he knows where he is: the nemeton. Fucking stump.

The sun is rising. He stumbles to the stump and collapses down on it, legs splayed out, tilts his head back to watch the light spread.

… wait. He twists to look at the stump, at the bits of shadow spread over it. He reaches out to touch them; sparks flare on his fingers. "Fox?" he whispers. "What are you doing there?"

The shadows speed toward him, bouncing up over his hands and arms; more sparks flare, but not as a threat. "How do I put you back?" he asks.

He doesn't want to be a _he_ anymore, singular. He wants to be a _they_ again. He wraps his arms around his middle and dives down into his mind, back to that room where he and the fox really met the first time. Where they promised.

The room is empty, the door sealed shut. He goes to it, gathers up all the spark, and blasts the door as hard as he can. Again and again and the fourth time, it finally splinters, shadows streaming in around the shards, through the cracks.

He waits as the shadows manifest into the fox. "There's a witch," the fox says.

"Of course there is," he replies.

At the same moment, they lunge to each other, wrapping in and around and through and out, and then _they_ open _their_ eyes.

"Let's go hunting," they say. They remember now – a curse cast on the pack, separating everyone into multiple pieces. All of the werewolves are now wolf and human, two parts away from each other.

A curse to separate the fox and Stiles. Did the witch know? Did she tell?

_Hunting_, they think. And then an execution. After the witch is dead, they'll also have to find all of the wolves to reunite with the human.

They stretch out their senses, to the edge of their territory and back, and _there_. A straight shot to the east there is an outsider with magic.

Was the intention harmful or mischievous? It doesn't matter. Strife is only fun when _they_ cause it, and the witch _hurt_ them, made them be alone again. She hurt the pack, which is _theirs_.

Pain tastes like fire, and she'll feel the burn.


End file.
